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An Encounter with the Russian Czar: The Image of Peter The Great in Early Qajar Historical Writings

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Maryam Ekhtiar
Maryam Ekhtiar*
Affiliation:
Asian Art Department, The Brooklyn Museum
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Extract

Persian historical sources, especially those of the early Qajar period, devote more attention to the achievements of the Russian czar Peter I (r. 1682-1725) than to any other “modern” European monarch. The image of Peter the Great captured the attention of Iranian reformers, who articulated their own hopes by glorifying him as the regenerator of the Russian Empire. They drew an ambiguous image of the czar, portraying him, on the one hand, with admiration and esteem and, on the other, with fear and mistrust. Yet the Qajar ruling elite looked to Peter as a sort of mirror in which they could see their own reflection and as a symbol crucial to the construction of a discourse that in their minds would lead to change, a discourse that resonated naturally with the political requirements of their nation. By using Czar Peter as a point of reference, Iranian reformers expressed their dismay at the deteriorating international status of Iran and the urgency to arrive at solutions.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 29 , Issue 1-2 , Spring Winter 1996 , pp. 57 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1996

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Footnotes

*

An earlier draft of this article was presented at the 1995 Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. I am grateful to Dr. Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi for his generosity in sharing his ideas and suggestions for the revision of this paper with me. His insightful comments have been incorporated.

References

1. For information on Peter I and eighteenth-century Russia see Raeff, Marc, Problems in European Civilization: Peter the Great, Reformer or Revolutionary? (Boston: Heath & Co., 1963)Google Scholar; Atkin, Muriel, Russia and Iran, 1780–1828 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1980)Google Scholar; Riasanovsky, Nicholas V., The Image of Peter the Great in Russian History and Thought (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985)Google Scholar; Garrard, J. G., The Eighteenth Century in Russia (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973)Google Scholar.

2. Shirazi, Shirazi Mirza Salih, Guzārish-i safar-i Mīrzā Ṣāliḥ Shīrāzī, ed. Shahidi, Humayun, (Tehran: Rah-i naw, 1984), 116Google Scholar. A second edition of this safarndmah was published in 1985. See Salih, Muhsin Mirza Majmū'ah-yi safarnāmahhā-yi Mīrzā Ṣālḥ Shīrāzī, ed. Salih, Ghulam Husayn Mirza (Tehran: Majmu'ah-yi mutun va asnad-i tarikhi, 1985)Google Scholar. Here, Mirza Salih outlines his intentions in writing his travelogue.

3. Jaubert, P. Am., Voyage en Arménie et en Perse (Paris: E. Ducrocq, Libraire-Éditeur, 1821), 155–56Google Scholar.

4. Marvi, Muhammad Kazim, ‘Ālam-ārā-yi Nādirī, ed. Riyahi, Muhammad Amin, 3 vols. (Tehran: Kitabfurushi-yi Zavvar, 1985), 1:410Google Scholar, 32.

5. Ibid., 410–11, 2:460–61 and 648–49, 3:1075–76.

6. Ibid. 3:1075. See also Pirnia, Sayyid ‘Ali, Khāstigārī-yi Nādīr Shah az impirdtur-i Ruslyah (Tehran: Atlas, 1986)Google Scholar.

7. Astarabadi, Mirza Mahdi, Tārīkh-i jahān-gushā-yi Nādirī (Tehran: Dunya-yi kitab, 1990), 242Google Scholar, 348.

8. Shushtari, ‘Abd al-Latif, Tuḥfat al-'ālam. (Hyderabad: Matba’ Shawkat al-Islam, 1801), 261Google Scholar. I would like to thank Dr. Tavakoli for bringing this discussion to my attention.

9. Ibid., 261–63

10. Mirza Salih, Guzārish, 55; Afshar, Mustafa, Safarnāmah-yi Khusraw Mīrzā, ed. Gulbun, Muhammad (Tehran: Kitabkhanah-yi Mustawfi, 1970), 238Google Scholar, 241. These passages indicate that some members of ‘Abbas Mirza's court had a knowledge of French.

11. See Adamiyat, Firaydun, Amīr Kabīr va Īrān (Tehran: hwarazmi, 1969), 163Google Scholar; Browne, Edward G., The Press and Poetry of Modern Persia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914Google Scholar; repr. Los Angeles: Kalimat Press, 1983), 9.

12. Adamiyat, Amīr Kabīr, 162.

13. Kotzebue, M. von, Narrative of a Journey into Persia in the Suite of the Imperial Russian Embassy in the Year 1817 (London, 1819), 162Google Scholar.

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15. Jaubert, Voyage, 156–57.

16. Voltaire, , “Histoire de l'empire de Russie sous Pierre le Grand,” in Pomeau, René, ed., Ouevres historiques (Paris: Édition Gallimard, 1957), 417–22Google Scholar, 527, 528, 565. Several English versions of the work were published in the eighteenth century, the most notable of which is the edition of Voltaire's collected works by Tobias Smollett and his colleagues. According to Michael Jenkins (translator of the 1983 English edition), there seems to be no new translation later than 1812. See Voltaire, Russia under Peter the Great, trans. Jenkins, Michael (Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1983), 12Google Scholar.

17. Voltaire, “Histoire,” 535.

18. Dunbuli, ‘Abd al-Razzaq Beg, Ma'dthir al-sultdniyah, ed. Afshar, Ghulam Husayn Sadri (Tehran: Ibn Sina, 1972), 101Google Scholar.

19. Voltaire, “Histoire,” 388.

20. “The Enlightenment can be defined as a stage in the long process of the secularization of Western thought since the Middle Ages. It may be regarded, in historical perspective, as a provisional culmination of attempts to provide a universally valid approach to the explanation of the world, for which the theological approach of the medieval mind, rooted in revelation and church tradition, had proved increasingly inadequate. It was primarily a philosophical movement characterized by a reliance on reason and experience rather than dogma and tradition, and by an emphasis on humanitarianism, political goals and social progress” (Gagliardo, John G., Enlightened Despotism [New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1967]Google Scholar). See the following critics of Enlightenment thought for other definitions: Gay, Peter, The Enlightenment: An Interpretation (New York: Vintage Books, 1968)Google Scholar; Cassirer, Ernst, The Philosophy of the Enlightenment (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979)Google Scholar; Hampson, Norman, The Enlightenment (London: Penguin Books, 1968)Google Scholar; Krieger, Leonard, Kings and Philosophers, 1689–1789 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970)Google Scholar.

21. Voltaire, Histoire de Charles XII (Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1968), 44Google Scholar.

22. Dunbuli, Ma‘āthir, 100–101.

23. Mirza Salih, Guzārish, 137–42.

24. ‘Alavi, Mirza Hadi, Dalīl al-sufarā, ed. Muhammad, Gulbun (Tehran: Dunya-yi Kitab, 1984), 133Google Scholar.

25. Voltaire, “Histoire,” 445–46.

26. ‘Alavi, Dalīl al-sufarā, 133

27. Mirza Salih, Guzārish, 116. I have not been able to locate this text. An intertextual comparison between passages in this text and those in Guzārish-i safar and Dalil al-sufarā would be important in determining how these Persian writers rearticulated historical information in their accounts.

28. Ibid., 138.

29. Ibid., 115–16.

30. Franz Lefort was a Swiss adventurer and soldier of fortune who became a Russian general. He was Peter's closest and most influential favorite until his death in 1699. He was, however, a controversial figure and considered by some scholars as the most unpopular of Peter's associates. See Barlett, R. P., Cross, A. G. and Rasmussen, Karen, eds., Russia and the World of the Eighteenth Century (Columbus: Slavica Publishers, Inc., 1988), 10Google Scholar; Schuyler, Eugene, Peter the Great, Emperor of Russia: A Study of Historical Biography (New York: Charles Scribner's and Sons, 1890), 227Google Scholar, 231, 234.

31. Mirza Salih, Guzārish, 138.

32. Ibid.

33. Afshar, Safarnāmah, 143.

34. Ibid., 244.

35. Voltaire, “Histoire,” 377.

36. Afshar, Safarnāmah, 244.

37. Ibid., 246.

38. Ibid., 246–47.

39. Browne, Press and Poetry, 9. These texts were not published until 1263/1847. A copy of the 1847 Persian translation of History of Russia is housed in the British Library, Oriental and India Office collections, 14773i20.

40. al-Saltanah, Taj, Khāṭirāt-i Tāj al-Saltanah, ed. Ittihadiyah, Mansurah (Ettehadieh, Mansoureh) Nizam-Mafi, and Sa'dvandiyan, Sirus (Tehran: Nashr-i tarikh-i Iran, 1991), 93Google Scholar; trans. Vanzan, Anna and Neshati, Amin as Crowning Anguish: Memoirs of A Persian Princess from the Harem to Modernity, ed. Amanat, Abbas (Washington, D.C.: Mage, 1993), 275Google Scholar.